Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Baseball and softball could merge into one international governing body in hopes of returning to the Olympics.

The sports are meeting with Olympic officials this week to find out how much co-operation is required to regain their summer games status, International Softball Federation President Don Porter said Tuesday.

“There are a lot of benefits of being an Olympic sport. That is what you have to weigh against losing your identity,” Porter told The Associated Press.

Porter and International Baseball Federation (IBAF) President Riccardo Fraccari are meeting separately with IOC sports director Christophe Dubi to get a better idea of the bidding process for the 2020 Olympic program.

Fraccari said the sports “have to study many things.” Baseball-playing countries must first back a joint bid at a Dec. 3 meeting in Dallas.

Baseball and softball are competing with karate, roller sports, sports climbing, squash, wakeboard and wushu for one spot on the 2020 program. The IOC will vote on the sports in September 2013.

The IOC voted in 2005 to remove baseball and softball from the Olympic program after the 2008 Beijing Games.

Two years ago, baseball and softball failed to get IOC support for the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics when offering separate proposals for women’s baseball and men’s softball. Golf and seven-a-side rugby, which offered men’s and women’s medal events, were voted onto the 2016 program.

Baseball and softball officials now agree, following IOC advice, that co-operation is their best hope of regaining Olympic status.

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Baseball and softball are competing with karate, roller sports, sports climbing, squash, wakeboard and wushu for one spot on the 2020 program.

Really? I would have thought the Olympic committee already looked at those two as one sport, since men don't play softball and vice-versa. Which of those would anyone really want to see on TV more than baseball? I get that baseball isn't super popular world wide like some soccer, but it has to have a higher 'watchability rating' than any of these sports. (unless wushu is the some sport that involves bikinis like volleyball, in which case baseball is doomed)

do the olympics really need any more combat sports? aren't judo, wrestling, and boxing enough?

also, i think sports climbing would be pretty cool.

and the olympics really should have baseball, but if they're not getting major league players, why bother?. there really could be an awesome international tournament between the US, cuba, dominican republic, venezuela, canadia, mexico, japan, korea, taiwan, and the netherlands, but if they're not drawing the best players in the world, what are they playing for?

Because, as we all know, the best male players in the world play Olympic Soccer. And, of course, who can forget seeing Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather going at it for Olympic Gold?

i don't think i've ever actually seen an olympic soccer game, so i'll just assume that first thing is sarcastic.

and related to the 2nd thing, is there a $20 million payday for pacquiao or mayweather to compete in the olympics?

and even if there was, i believe olympic boxing is strictly an amateur sport, which is probably for the best, because boxing in the olympics is an abomination; the scoring criteria are absurd and render the whole thing meaningless in determining the quality of an individual fighter.

and so long as we're talking about combat sports, that fight last saturday was horrendous. for as much as velasquez was built up prior to the fight, that's really gotta be the worst title reign in the history of the UFC. the guy beat lesnar 90 seconds into the first round to take the title, then had surgery on his shoulder and didn't fight again for 13 months. and when he finally did fight, he got KO'd in 64 seconds.

i might be missing one, but has there been a less inspiring championship reign than his?

i might be missing one, but has there been a less inspiring championship reign than his?

Three consecutive heavyweight champs in the early 1930's failed to defend their title; losing in their next match. I think it goes: Primo Carnera, Max Baer, and James Braddock, but going from memory.

Do the olympics still have race-walking? That sport is the dumbest, well one of the dumbest. Aside from 20 archery events for the Chinese to clean up on. WHo really needs archery anyways? Do the chinese still defend their borders with archers or something?

i might be missing one, but has there been a less inspiring championship reign than his?

I'm going to have to go with Kevin Randleman there. Gets a shot at the Heavyweight title at UFC 20 (which had just been vacated by Randy Couture) and loses to Bas Rutten. Bas gets hurt and never fights in the UFC again, so Randleman gets another shot at the open title in his very next fight (at UFC 23) even though he just lost a title fight, and wins a grinding five-round decision against Pete Williams. Randleman's scheduled to defend his title for the first time at UFC 24 against Pedro Rizzo, but backstage during the preliminary card he slips on a loose pipe in the locker room, hits his head, and knocks himself unconscious. With no main event, the UFC is forced to pay back millions in refunds to unsatisfied customers. Randleman gets another crack at Rizzo at UFC 26, and defeats him in what's often considered the worst fight of the "modern" era of the UFC (i.e. the era of events with timed rounds). Over five rounds, Randleman and Rizzo launch only a handful of strikes, most of which fail to connect, and fans boo and throw garbage into the ring. Then, Randleman faces Randy Couture (the guy who started all this by vacating his title in the first place) at UFC 28, and gets beat up.

It wasn't that bad. Velasquez was feeling the pressure of the big stage and trying to put on a show, wasn't cautious enough, and got cracked. A shot like that will beat anybody and is one of the hazards of the sport.

I imagine he'll come back strong and fight well. The Heavyweights rarely offer the best UFC fight.

How about: The men try to hit a softball thrown from 45 feet, and the women try to hit a baseball throw from 60 + 6. Might work. But how long would the bases be? And the fences? Easier to fine tune the fences than the bases, I think.

The Phi Beta Kappa Society, founded on 5 December 1776, at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, is generally recognized as the first Greek-letter student society in North America.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) is an international corporation based in Lausanne, Switzerland, created by Pierre de Coubertin on 23 June 1894

From Wikipedia. Learn something new every day.
I could've guessed the IOC dated to around the turn of the century, but had no idea frats were so old.